


Secrets Once Kept

by RAW_SYNTH3TICA



Category: Snow Falling on Cedars - All Media Types
Genre: Biracial, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slash, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-15
Updated: 2013-02-15
Packaged: 2017-11-29 10:24:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/685875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RAW_SYNTH3TICA/pseuds/RAW_SYNTH3TICA
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Hatsue's mysterious death, Kabuo pays a visit to Ishmael as part of her will.<br/>*fixed errors*</p>
            </blockquote>





	Secrets Once Kept

**Author's Note:**

> ALL IS FICTIONAL & NOT MINE  
> enjoy~!

They sat face to face, neither saying a thing but quietly sipping coffee to fill in the space that seemed as if to deafen and make the silence louder. Kabuo hardly looked past his fingers clasped gently around the cup, his fingertips warmed by the hot ceramic and rising steam. Ishmael would always avert his eyes before now that Kabuo hadn’t seemed to mind at all or Care if he were being stared at, Ishmael unrolled his sleeves with his ink-stained fingertips as his guest silently stirred the coffee for the nth time, finally exposing the silverware from the glazed-white lip, he laid the spoon down on his napkin and continued to hold the cup. 

There was a hesitation, which turned into a longer pause with Kabuo staring into the coffee cup, his eyes hardly moving, finally he looked to Ishmael and said, “…Hatsue. She-” 

A tear slipped from the inner corner of his eye, he fiercely wiped it away with the back of his hand, and continued as if nothing had stopped him in the first place, “…Hatsue has never stopped thinking of you.” 

The most impolite way to rebuttal would have been to ask ‘how would you know?’, still Kabuo answered, “A man knows his wife. A man who Loves his wife understands her mind.” 

For the most part, Ishmael felt two things: One, their affairs in the past and near present were Always secret, two, - the fisherman handed him a note, once opening the letter, he saw a will. At the very near end there was a listing of an item, a package more like, Kabuo brought a crate from the floor unto the table as he stood, something that Ishmael had never seen before in the fisherman’s stance, a fear more potent and terrible than his sentencing at the courthouse. The moments which proceeded the judge’s ruling only seemed to disturb Kabuo Miyamoto’s air and his surroundings, this was a whole different Kabuo he was seeing at this moment. 

The wiped-away tear’s trail became an unending leak, trying to keep everything together and to hide himself, Kabuo turned away, facing the long emptiness of Ishmael’s kitchen, he declared quietly, “Hatsue wanted you to have those. She said she wanted to be exactly how you remembered her.” 

Wax paper wrapped in cord were in the crate, Ishmael at first felt the smooth coolness of the paper, yet there was a tug in his gut that he felt toward Kabuo, the husband breaking under the pressure of not feeling something that was there only days before, and Ishmael moved only a twitch. Unable to help himself, he went to Kabuo’s side, at first met with a wall crumbling and hunched slightly readily to break, he put an arm around Kabuo’s shoulder, merely letting the other man sense his presence. The silent tears just then became quiet sobs, so painful did each breath seem to return to Hatsue’s husband only to come out an mournful wheeze, Ishmael felt the other’s hand go to his wrist, the skin cool but hold contrastingly warm, he quietly whispered Kabuo’s name and turned the man around. 

Instantly, they seemed to stand and fall together, tumbling only Ishmael held Kabuo up from the floor, they stood with the reporter holding the fisherman. They were different as society seemed to make of them, as if two countries existed on the island whereas they were all American, Ishmael stopped caring when he fell in love with Hatsue, and Kabuo could still hardly understand after having had served overseas in a country he had hardly known, all because Uncle Sam said it was right. The only thing that tied them together was their misunderstanding of Hatsue and the part of them both that she took with her. She was always fleeting, running like fog rolling in and out of the islands, exactly the way Ishmael became: a presence who was only known because he had a name. 

Ishmael felt the many years of work and suffering etched into stone nestled on his shoulder, the trembling upper torso he soothed and warmed with his left hand running over Kabuo’s back, he kept his right hand over the fisherman’s shoulder, just allowing simple human contact for them both since neither had the chance for the simplest of friendly gestures. Until the hearth needed stoking for the cooler hours following evening, Kabuo moved, light was dulling and turning the sky a milky gray from mist, but they stood alas looking each other in the eye, and Ishmael recognized a saying Hatsue once said, and now only wholly when seeing Kabuo did it seem true. 

The Japanese man stepped back half a pace, Ishmael followed, he took a kerchief from his pocket, dabbing gently along Kabuo’s round cheekbones and strong jaw line, he quoted Hatsue, “A man whose heart is ‘strong and gentle’.” 

Night drew closer while only the two could see was the dry shine of tear-trails, Ishmael rose slightly on his toes and followed the damp warmth with his lips, little by little he felt the source against him, suddenly it was gone. He opened his eyes to see Kabuo leaning over the fire, stoking the embers back to life with small tinder and a couple of logs, the Japanese man stood and turned to Ishmael who lit an oil lamp and appeared lost in his own home. 

For making his host uncomfortable, Kabuo was sorry, he leaned against a pantry door and said, “I’m a widower.” 

Unsurprised, Ishmael knew deep inside himself how regretful he was of not being as expressive of his grief as his guest, but he had the small comfort that he mourned the loss of Hatsue years ago when she refused to marry him, and ended his grieving just weeks ago the days when she was still alive and back in the arms of her husband. Kabuo looked unsure of the situation, his expression fluctuating between that of hurt and the other of sickness as deep and unseen as the ocean, he was so very lost in his emotions, so terribly drawn and torn from Ishmael due to their history with his wife. 

“Sorry if I can’t stay, I’ll leave-” he buttoned up his coat and fetched his cap from the table, as if he forgot something, Kabuo left the door open, he inhaled and finally settled on a confusing farewell, “Look inside. You’ll have something of hers’ I could never touch.” 

With the door shut, Ishmael could finally admit how afraid of Kabuo he was in the past few hours, and how much more apprehensive he was of opening the wax paper inside the crate, his fingers inched over the wood and pulled back after crinkling the undisturbed single-knot cord holding the package together. The reporter pulled a loose end of the knot until the ends slipped free, he parted the waxed sheets, his fingers pulled from the crate a kimono, the color slightly faded and indecipherable in the weak light from the lamp, but he knew it was that from her days as the Strawberry Princess. He buried himself in the thin silk, remembering his times standing afar, watching as Hatsue Imada passed his grasp just yards away atop a papier-mâché float, and he knew within himself that he would always deliberately Watch life pass by flavorless and dull. 

Finally, he understood what part of Hatsue he had that Kabuo could never: Memories of Hatsue’s true nature, of the wonder and desire in her heart. 

He felt the Need to be near Kabuo, the hunger within himself to be Close enough to Kabuo to breathe easier, because he was the last one to see his beloved alive, he was the one who helplessly watched as she wasted away and eventually died, though no doctor knew why since she was healthy and young. Hatsue gave up on life, and so her body gave up living. 

Ishmael went out seeing how Kabuo was still parked with the engine running, he trudged through the snow and let himself into the car, he worked up enough courage to say what he once said to Hatsue before they went their separate ways, he gulped and whispered, “Let me hold you one last time and I’ll never speak to you again.” 

Kabuo’s lips trembled, his eyes unfocused and glazing over with wiped tears, he rigidly sat in the drivers’ seat, both hands gripping the steering wheel with white knuckles and sweaty fingers, he blinked once, shedding a lake unto his cheekbones as he did. Ishmael kept still and turned to Kabuo, the two tensed as the Japanese widower unhanded the steering wheel to shift the car into a gear, several clicks and Kabuo exhaled in defeat. He inched a little to the vehicle’s middle-seat, staring half-lidded ahead to the squeak of the windshield wipers swiping away snow, he dipped his chin slowly once. 

Ishmael wrapped his arms around the other and flinching, feeling first how in contrast to Kabuo was two years ago, bulky and wrung with muscle, he now sat whittled and feeble, sensing so, Kabuo whispered to the reporter more to settle him and ease his worry, “Hatsue took my appetite with her.” 

Regretting how he reacted to Kabuo, Ishmael pressed his lips softly against the side of Kabuo’s head, warmly once above his ear and another at his near to his nape, he answered, “Mine, too.” 

“We finally have something in common, Chambers.” 

“Besides Hatsue?” 

“Besides Hatsue.” 

Kabuo spoke under his breath, not able to hear, Ishmael asked in the same tone, “What?” 

“Something I once said to Hatsue-,” Kabuo trailed off, remembering the magic his words once held which now seemed like a hammer to his ears, he repeated, “On our wedding night, I said to her-” 

He turned to Ishmael, “ ‘Soshite ima, watashi wa jinsei no utsukushi-sa o rikai suru'.” 

Kabuo translated himself slowly, somatic yet cloying with the charm of his wounded tone, “ ‘And I now understand the beauty of life’.” 

In the dull gray light provided by the sunken sun, Kabuo was incomparably handsome, the harsh sternness of his face melding into that more beautiful than an exquisite geisha, his dark eyes lowered and lips welcoming, he spoke then when Ishmael had an excessive time by several hours and a stiffness in their bodies to both hold and silently appraise, “Time’s up.” 

Once again, Ishmael was watching as something that could have been more drive away in the snow. He looked to his timepiece and realized that it was well past midnight, he trudged up his porch and into his home, he went into the kitchen closed the bottom door of the stove as he took his seat at the small dinner table, the lone crate and burned out wick of the lamp seeming as if to stare at him for the next move. The reporter took a matchbox out from a cupboard and struck the side, he relit the wick and blew out the match, now only the crate teased him with it’s contents. Ishmael took out the folded kimono with it’s cloth wrappings and set the ceremonial clothing aside, at the very bottom of the crate lay a pair of cotton gloves which were white, but now aged and stained with strawberry juice and plantation soil. 

Indeed he had the vivid memory of his childhood with Hatsue, yet now as an adult, Ishmael Chambers only had but to wonder since sorrow was now gone if he was in love with his first love’s widower. 

Time alone told if Kabuo Miyamoto could heal from the wounds inflicted by Hatsue’s absence.

**Author's Note:**

> i read this book FOREVER ago (in middle school, because i was a nerd & a book worm) & i've just watched the film adaptation, both are beautiful & i've always wanted to see how this would play out.


End file.
